


In two thousand and nine, you were two thousand and fine

by defractum (nyargles)



Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Fluff, Getting Together, London, Love Confessions, M/M, Oblivious, Paris (City)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-06
Updated: 2014-07-06
Packaged: 2018-02-07 16:49:04
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,591
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1906524
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nyargles/pseuds/defractum
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Combeferre gives him a pitying look. “You bought him chocolates on Valentine’s Day.”</p><p>“I was hungry. We were studying together. The chocolate was on offer.”</p><p> </p><p>  <i>Grantaire's been in love since forever; Enjolras has been oblivious since forever.<i></i></i></p>
            </blockquote>





	In two thousand and nine, you were two thousand and fine

**Author's Note:**

  * For [sarahyyy](https://archiveofourown.org/users/sarahyyy/gifts).



“Combeferre,” whispers Enjolras, as he lets himself into his best friends’ room and sits himself on the carpet. “Grantaire is in love with me.” Combeferre groans and rolls over. “Were you asleep?” asks Enjolras.

Considering that it is 3am and the lights are off and Combeferre is in bed with the covers tucked over him, that’s probably a good observation. “Nnnrrggh,” says Combeferre, and Enjolras remembers, too little too late, that Combeferre is incapable of forming real words before his first cup of coffee that day.

“Wait,” says Enjolras. “I’ll be right back.”

Enjolras settles for instant coffee, because it’s quicker, and totes it back up to Combeferre’s room, putting it on the bedside table and pushing it towards Combeferre hopefully. “Nnnrgh,” says Combeferre, lurching upright like a zombie, lured in by the smell of coffee.

“Blaaaargh!” moans Courfeyrac, from the other side of Combeferre. “Go ‘way.” It’s too late though – Combeferre functions on autopilot until after coffee, and has already curled himself around it, his eyes blearily open but refusing to focus on anything. Enjolras watches his brain slowly boot up with each increasing sip of coffee, until the mug is empty and Combeferre stretches.

It’s then he notices that it’s still dark outside.

“Whassa time?” asks Combeferre, tapping his watch in confusion.

“Just after three am?”

Combeferre looks at Enjolras, “Did you just feed me coffee at three in the morning so you could talk to me? I thought I was late for a meeting. Enjolras!”

“Fuck off!” groans Courfeyrac, from where his face is mashed into Combeferre’s hip, pulling the covers over his head and rolling over with wordless grumbles until he’s a burrito on the other side of the bed.

Enjolras holds a hand out imploringly to Combeferre, Combeferre who is sitting naked on his bed with dried come trailing across his stomach and thighs and who suddenly looks ready to fucking murder Enjolras. “I _really_ need to talk to you.”

Despite the way Combeferre is pinching the bridge of his nose, Enjolras knows he’s won when Combeferre reaches for his glasses. “Well I’m hardly going to be able to sleep after the coffee,” he says, sighing, and holds a hand up before Enjolras can start speaking. “Downstairs. Ten minutes. I need a shower. Some things, you don’t need to see.”

“I don’t know what _else_ you’re expecting me to see,” says Enjolras critically, eyeing the dried white streaks but Combeferre glowers at him, and he flees.

-

Fifteen minutes later, Combeferre ambles down to their shared living room where Enjolras has curled himself into an armchair, his legs tucked up underneath him as he drums his fingers on the armrest.

“What is it?” asks Combeferre, tugging the other armchair closer. “Enjolras?”

“Grantaire,” says Enjolras with glassy eyes, which means he hasn’t actually gone to bed yet. “He told me he’s in love with me.”

Combeferre waits for more details, and then gently prompts when none appear forthcoming, “Yes? And?”

A quick frown slips past Enjolras’s face, his defences too far down to think of keeping his every feeling to himself. “You don’t sound surprised.”

“I’m not,” says Combeferre.

“You knew?”

“Of course.”

There’s a long pause, as if Enjolras is trying to parse that thought. “But he only told me today. Just now. Tonight. He said he wanted to catch up so I said we should skype and… he told me. How long have you known?”

Combeferre shrugs. “Twenty minutes after he met you.”

“ _What_ ,” says Enjolras, so startled that he leans out of his armchair.

Combeferre licks his lips, and tries his hardest not to think that he could be in his warm bed with his warm boy right now, and instead he’s probably going to have destroyed his sleep pattern for the rest of the week because some idiot fed him coffee in the middle of the night. “Grantaire... wasn’t subtle about it. And you didn’t exactly... discourage it.”

Enjolras tilts his head. It’s for this exact reason that Combeferre had never mentioned it to him before. Enjolras had simply never noticed that Grantaire saw him that way. “What do you mean, I didn’t discourage it?” he asks quietly.

Combeferre gives him a pitying look. “You bought him chocolates on Valentine’s Day.”

“I was hungry. We were studying together. The chocolate was on offer.”

“Because it was _Valentine’s Day_. You always waited for him before we could go to the dinner hall every day.”

“We always got the same table and there were four seats at it.”

“You always shared your food.”

“We got one of both meal options and shared so we could always try everything,” says Enjolras, voice getting increasingly higher as things start falling into place. “And besides, you and Courfeyrac did the same thing.”

“Courfeyrac and I were _dating_.”

With a pause, Enjolras finally says, “Oh.”

“Oh,” repeats Combeferre, reaching over to squeeze Enjolras’s knee lightly. Just because he secretly thinks it was almost impossible to hide the size of Grantaire’s torch for Enjolras, it doesn’t mean that he doesn’t feel some sympathy for Enjolras, realising it all now, four years too late.

“This is gold,” says Courfeyrac from behind them. He has bedhead and is swathed in Combeferre’s dressing gown and there are dark circles beneath his eyes but he’s holding a notebook and studiously taking notes. “How did you get onto this topic in the first place?”

Enjolras shrugs. “He saw me on online and asked if I wasn’t busy, for once–” which is understandable because Enjolras mostly keeps his skype on away or busy, “–and said we should catch up.”

“So you skype chatted with him, aaaaand?” says Courfeyrac, squishing himself in to the same armchair as Combeferre, despite the entire sofa on his right.

“And we talked a bit about what we were up to, and then he said it was good to see me after so long, that I looked as lovely as ever and that he had always liked me. Since the first time he met me.”

“And you–”

Enjolras buries his head in his hands, and groans. “And I squawked out loud like a chicken.”

“ _No_ ,” says Courfeyrac in breathless delight, and the only reason Combeferre doesn’t do the same is because he’s too busy stifling a laugh in his forearm.

“And he laughed, and told me he didn’t expect me to return his feelings or to do anything about it, it was just really nice to have been able to finally tell me and told me I should get more sleep, and…” Enjolras shrugs his shoulders helplessly. “I was too surprised to even say goodbye properly.”

“You old romantic, you,” says Courfeyrac.

Combeferre plucks the pen out of Courf’s fingers, not that it’s likely to do much good because Courfeyrac has a great memory. “And _are_ you going to do something about it?”

“I don’t know,” says Enjolras. “What could I do? It’s not like we’ve kept in touch for the last five years. It would be odd to suddenly start talking to him and he’d _know_ I was doing it because of what he told me.”

Combeferre hums and nods, and squeezes his wrist comfortingly as Enjolras fiddles with the hem of his cuff. He knows what Enjolras is like when there’s something he genuinely can’t do anything about.

“I wish he’d told me earlier,” says Enjolras. “I thought he liked _you_.”

Combeferre’s hands freezes. A noise erupts out of Courfeyrac’s mouth like a sneezing hippo. “Sorry,” he says, “I couldn’t help it. You thought Grantaire liked _Combeferre_?”

“He always asked after Combeferre. Wanted to know if he was out or anything.”

Courfeyrac looks appalled, and Enjolras shrinks back into the armchair. “Enjolras, he wanted to know if he would get to be _alone_ with you in your room.”

“Also, because I am a wonderful human being and therefore he genuinely cared about my wellbeing,” says Combeferre with a straight face, and it’s testament to how distracted Enjolras is that he doesn’t even pick up on the fact that he’s not being serious, just nods along like that makes perfect sense.

“What am I going to do,” says Enjolras, looking terribly lost. Courfeyrac and Combeferre exchange looks, and then pile into the same armchair as Enjolras for a big cuddle pile.

“Do you have feelings for him?”

Enjolras considers it. “No. I’ve never thought of him in that way.”

From somewhere near Enjolras’s shoulder, Combeferre eventually says, “Then nothing. Grantaire had a thousand chances to say something when we were at university, and he chose not to for reasons of his own. Maybe he just needed to tell you now to get some closure on it. But he said that he didn’t expect you to do anything, so you’re going file this away as knowledge and then get on with your life.”

They bury that night in a haze of movies, Enjolras still too wound up to sleep, Combeferre caffeinated and Courfeyrac curled between them, softly snoring. And then they get on with their lives.

Little things fall into place for Enjolras over the next couple of days, like the answers Grantaire would give whenever anyone asked if he was seeing someone, or the way they used to study together, sprawled across a small dorm bed and their respective books and papers scattered around them.

Every time Enjolras sees the small ‘online’ green icon on skype next to Grantaire’s name, he wonders if he should call him, or IM him. Ask him what he’s been doing these last few years as an excuse to talk to him. Except Enjolras knows how he’s doing – Grantaire had caught him up on that at least before dropping his surprise.

“You’ve kept in touch with Grantaire, right?” Enjolras asks Courfeyrac, three days later when they’re working on the final touches of the presentation he’s going to give next week.

“On and off,” says Courfeyrac. “Why?”

“Not sure,” says Enjolras honestly. “I just always thought that if he kept in touch with anyone from uni, it would be me rather than you because we were so close.”

“You were close because he was in love with you. It’s hard to sustain that after university, with jobs and real life and long distance. Also, I have him on Facebook, so I stay updated on the things he shares with everyone else with minimal effort.” Enjolras doesn’t have a Facebook, had only had one for about two months before deleting his account.

Enjolras clears his throat. “Okay, let’s go over this one more time.” He lets work consume him for the next few days. The presentation is in London, which means that reps from the International Headquarters will be there and if Enjolras impresses them, he’ll manage to secure more funding for the significantly smaller Paris branch. Enjolras is good at letting work consume him.

He stumbles off the Eurostar at St Pancras station, and it takes him a moment to get his bearings. It doesn’t matter how many business trips he makes; Kings Cross St Pancras is still huge and confusing every time. At least he’d remembered not to arrive during rush hour this time.

“Enjolras!”

Enjolras whirls around. “...Grantaire?”

It is indeed. Grantaire waves, looking barely a year older than the last time they’d walked out of university, Enjolras into a Masters and Grantaire with a placement in New York. He’s even carrying a sign with Enjolras’s name on it.

“How did you know I was going to be here?” Enjolras blinks and frowns.

Grantaire’s eyebrows shoot up so high they get lost under the fuzzy curls drooping over his forehead. “I’m collecting you. Unless you felt like trying to get to my flat by yourself with luggage?”

“What? Your... flat?”

Grantaire stops from where he’s trying to pick up Enjolras’s small carry-on suitcase for him, straightens up and looks at him. “You didn’t know. Courfeyrac didn’t tell you.”

Enjolras closes his eyes and groans.

“He said you were here for a conference and asked if I could put you up since I live near the Excel centre.”

“Thank you,” says Enjolras, because he’s going to kill Courfeyrac for setting all of this up without telling him, but he does have manners. “No, I didn’t know. I assumed I’d be staying at the same hotel I normally do. But if you actually live near the Excel centre then thank you.” The Excel centre is infamously annoying to get to from central London.

Waving his hand, Grantaire scoops up Enjolras’s luggage with one hand, fending Enjolras off as he tries to protest, and then launches immediately into an anecdote about work. Enjolras feels like he’s slipped back in time. Nothing seems to have changed since then, they fall into conversations just as easily as if the last five years – and the conversation two weeks ago – haven’t pushed a gap between them.

“Ta-da,” says Grantaire when they finally reach his flat, a reasonable sized place in Canary Wharf which probably means it costs more than the house Enjolras rents with Courfeyrac and Combeferre. “Spare bedroom’s over there, kitchen right here, bathroom’s down that corridor there, and I’m on the end. Wifi password is Cupcake, capital C. Sorry about the mess in the bedroom, by the way. I mostly use it as a study.”

Enjolras nods, like he’s been doing for most of the last hour, because despite how convenient Paris to London is these days, travelling is still tiring. “This is amazing,” he says, glancing around the living room. It had probably started out as a normal room, but it’s clearly been redesigned and refurbished multiple times, with paintings and ledges and installations all over the place, large smooth pieces of wood and glass that had only been conceptual drawings in Grantaire’s notepad when they were students, now writ large and sculpted into his own place.

“Bitch to clean though,” says Grantaire with a grin. “Oh hey, this is Cupcake. Cupcake, this is not-mum.”

Enjolras looks down at the fattest, fluffiest, grumpiest cat he’s seen in his life as it squints up at him through grey fur that covers its eyes. “Cupcake?”

“Well. He was a bit smaller and cuter when I got him.”

“ _Not-mum_?”

“I’m mum. Everyone else is not-mum.”

That makes more sense than Enjolras would like to admit. Cupcake claws his ways up Enjolras’s suitcase, curls up on the top of it, and pretends to go to sleep. Enjolras makes some excuse about how he has last minute prep to do for the convention, and escapes to the spare bedroom. Grantaire twitches an odd smile at him, because he knows that Enjolras never leaves anything to the last minute, but lets him go with no remark.

Enjolras shuts the door behind him, flops over onto the bed, and exhales. Then he scrabbles to get the wifi set up on his phone, and calls Courfeyrac.

“How’s the accommodation?” asks Courfeyrac, far too cheerfully. Enjolras just growls down the phone at him.

Eventually, the amused silence on the other end is too much. Rubbing his eyes, Enjolras admits, “It’s weird. It’s weird how _not_ weird it is. You know what I mean?”

“Yeah,” says Courfeyrac softly. “You going to be okay?”

“Yeah,” says Enjolras. “Thank you for the emotional preparation by the way.”

With a laugh, Courfeyrac says, “You would have freaked out if I’d told you first and then ruined it trying to say something the moment you got there. This way, you get there and it’s just nice.”

“Yeah,” says Enjolras, thinking that Courfeyrac knows him far too well. “Thanks.”

Whatever worries Enjolras has about things being strange with Grantaire are dissipated quickly. For one thing, Grantaire is just effortlessly normal with him and Enjolras knows that it just stands out all the more that he’s obviously feeling wrong-footed. For another thing, this is a business trip and like all the others, Enjolras is horrifically busy and tired.

Conflicting schedules means that Enjolras is up and out of the flat before Grantaire, and then by the time he gets back, Grantaire is out doing client meetings. When he gets back, he finds Enjolras half-passed out on the sofa and the tv playing Law and Order reruns because Cupcake is lying across his stomach and refuses to move and the remote is out of reach.

Grantaire stifles a laugh and takes a picture on his phone.

Incapable of doing much else, Enjolras sort of groans, and Cupcake snuggles into the vibrations in his chest.

It’s not actually that late, so Grantaire joins them, bumping his shoulders against Enjolras’s as he props his feet up on the coffee table. Grantaire is close enough that his hair tickles Enjolras’s neck, and he can smell the musky mixture of lead pencil and sweat and Enjolras has only the excuse that he’s tired and isn’t thinking things through when he leans over, dislodging Cupcake and pressing a kiss onto Grantaire’s lips.

Grantaire’s eyes go from drooping to wide open, his eyelashes brushing against Enjolras’s own, and he freezes. “Enjolras,” he says, very quietly, the words barely ghosting past Enjolras’s lips as he mouths them, “What are you doing?”

“I thought you were in love with me,” says Enjolras, blinking, slowly as his brain struggles to catch up.

Grantaire swallows, an audible noise since Enjolras is so close. “I do. But you aren’t in love with me.”

“I could be,” says Enjolras; it seems like the right thing to say.

Pushing him back gently, Grantaire sits up, putting a few inches of space between them. It’s conspicuous, all the more so because they had always draped themselves over each other when they were friends. “But you’re not,” says Grantaire with a sad smile. “So you don’t have to do this.”

Enjolras sits up too, reverse-sliding himself up the sofa. “I think I want to,” he says slowly.

An eyebrow twitches before Grantaire can stop it, and he purses his mouth at Enjolras. “Really? I pine after you for three years and you don’t even notice it, let alone return the sentiment; we fall out of touch and don’t talk for another five years; I let you know that I’ve liked you all this time; and now, _now_ you think you might be interested?” Though his voice starts out soft, it crescendos as his back gets steadily more rigid and he pulls away from Enjolras. Cupcake yowls softly as he raises his voice, and squirms under the sofa to hide. Enjolras wishes he could do the same.

“Maybe I’m attracted to people who like me,” says Enjolras.

Grantaire’s nostrils flare. Those were definitely the wrong words to say; Enjolras just can’t figure out why. “Maybe you like the attention. It feels good, doesn’t it, knowing someone likes you?”

“Yes,” says Enjolras. He can’t deny it, it’s true. He spreads his hands. It’s a struggle for words when he’s this tired but he feels like he has to say something. “But I gave as much of me to you as I’ve ever given anyone.”

A tiny hollow laugh tumbles out of Grantaire’s throat. “I know. It’s why I’ve never said anything before. Because – because it always felt like we were together anyway. It’s the closest thing I’ve had to a functioning relationship, at least.”

“Me too,” says Enjolras. “I think – do you want – We could give it a shot.”

“God. I am weak. So weak.” Grantaire gives him a small smile. “I hope you realise that I’m not really capable of saying no to you.”

Enjolras is a terrible person, and he knows it, because he opens his mouth and the next words out of it are: “Shall I kiss you again?”

He watches as Grantaire opens his mouth, works it in silence for a couple of moments, and then says, “Yes.” He really is incapable of saying ‘no’. Enjolras inches towards him and Grantaire looks as terrified as Enjolras has ever seen him but he curls his fingers into Enjolras’s shirt anyway, the work shirt he hasn’t had the energy to change out of, and his tongue flickers out nervously to wet his lips as he stares at Enjolras’s mouth.

When Enjolras kisses him, Grantaire’s eyes flutter shut and he melts into the back of the sofa; and then his eyes snap open again, searching Enjolras’s face to check he’s still there, it’s still him. Grantaire is warm and slightly sweaty, his deodorant wearing off and the curve of his back lean and warm against the palms of Enjolras’s hands.

They stay like that, not really kissing but not pulling apart each, Enjolras’s nose poking into Grantaire’s cheek and Grantaire’s stubble scratching against Enjolras’s skin, their legs tangled together. Grantaire raises a finger to trace the length of Enjolras’s cheekbone, the line of his jaw, wraps Enjolras’s hair around one finger and then pulls it off, letting the curl fall through his fingers.

“Still me,” says Enjolras. He’s not sure what Grantaire’s feeling – he’s not sure what being in love feels like. But then, he’s apparently got his bearings all wrong for Grantaire because Grantaire’s been in love with him since the day they met. No wonder Enjolras can’t tell when he’s in love. His baseline’s all wrong; he’s never seen Grantaire _out_ of love. But he does know that he likes it when Grantaire’s happy, and he likes the small, tentative smile that Grantaire’s giving him.

“I’ve had sex with a few guys who looked like you before,” says Grantaire hoarsely, quietly, apologetically.

“I thought you had a chip on your shoulder about priceless pieces of art and fakes,” says Enjolras and Grantaire bursts out into laughter. Enjolras grins, relieved that he can still tease Grantaire like before.

“You flatter yourself, I think,” says Grantaire, ignoring entirely the fact that he’s the one who routinely compared Enjolras to pieces of art. Cupcake chooses that moment to re-emerge, having lost the fight with a dust bunny and deeming it safe to come back out now Mum isn’t shouting, and crawls between them for cuddles.

That breaks them apart, sneezing bemusedly from the dust Cupcake brought, and Enjolras says reluctantly, “I should go to bed. I’ve got another day at the convention tomorrow.”

“Okay,” says Grantaire. “I’ll probably be up around noon, if you want to get lunch?”

Enjolras nods, and they companionably bump shoulders as they get up, Grantaire to the dining table that houses his work things now Enjolras is sleeping in the study to work on his clients’ requests and Enjolras to get ready for bed. He brushes his teeth and skypes home at the same time, knowing that Combeferre and Courfeyrac will be interested in the outcome of the presentation – he’d texted them during the day but it’s nice to able to talk about it too.

Except, Combeferre takes one look at his face, and says, “Enjolras, what did you _do_?”

Enjolras pauses, spits, and asks, “What? Did I get bad feedback online?” He hadn’t noticed anything particularly bad – the usual flamers and idiots, but nothing new.

“He means with Grantaire,” says Courfeyrac, popping into view as the two of them arrange the camera so Enjolras can see them both.

“Oh,” says Enjolras, and tells them. He expects Courfeyrac to cheer or clap or something and Combeferre to look mildly amused, so when silence falls after he’s finished talking about the kiss, and the talk of giving it a try, Enjolras wonders if the internet connection dropped. He frowns, and wipes the remaining toothpaste off his face. “Hello? Are you still there?”

“Yes,” says Courfeyrac, and he looks – somber? “Are you sure this is a good idea?”

“I – yes,” says Enjolras, puzzled. “Isn’t this what you wanted to happen?”

“Yes, but I also think it’s a little weird that it actually did,” says Courfeyrac. “I thought you said you’d never thought about him that way.”

“I hadn’t.”

“And you changed your mind in under a week,” says Courfeyrac. He sounds so uncharacteristically serious that Enjolras thinks it really might be a bad idea for a moment.

He tips his head, carrying the laptop so that he can flop across it. His aching feet twitch with relief. “Why do you sound like you disapprove? You’re the one who arranged all this in the first place.”

“So that Grantaire could get some closure,” says Courfeyrac. “I thought if he actually saw you again, he’d be reminded of all the things about you that are really annoying in person. Sometimes we miss the idea of a person more than the actual person.”

Enjolras knows Courfeyrac doesn’t mean it as a personal attack, so he lets it slide. “Well… he didn’t.”

“And neither did you, from the looks of it,” says Courfeyrac with a sigh. “Just – be careful, yeah?” There’s a wealth of meaning packed into those four words, and Enjolras gets the impression that he only understands about half of it.

“I’ll try.” It’s the best he can manage.

“We know you will,” says Combeferre firmly as somewhere in the background Courfeyrac mutters, ‘I have _got_ to write this down.’ “Tell us about the Q &A questions you got asked.”

A twenty minute chat later and Enjolras is starting to repeat his words and forgetting his chain of thought halfway through a sentence so Courfeyrac orders him to bed mid-yawn, the two of them waving as they hang up on him before he can protest.

Enjolras pushes the laptop to the side of the bed and rolls over, turning the lamp off. Then he’s left with his own thoughts in the darkness, and it’s as if talking to his friends had somehow temporarily stemmed them because now he’s wide awake again.

He gets up. Though the main lights in the living area are dimmed, the kitchen lights are on so Grantaire can work. Grantaire looks up from some blueprints. “Sorry,” he says, “Did I disturb you?”

“No,” says Enjolras, “No, I just – I know sometimes you have difficulty believing things are real once they’re out of your sight.”

Grantaire smiles lopsidedly. “Yep, that’s me. Never quite got the hang of object permanent,” he says, which is a very nice way to say that Enjolras has seen him suffer through alcoholism-related hallucination and paranoia bouts before.

“So – I just –” Enjolras leans forward and presses a kiss to Grantaire’s cheek. “Still here,” he says, and pads back to bed, savouring the surprised smile on Grantaire’s face. That feels right. He feels ready for bed now.

When Enjolras sets off for the conference the next morning, he glances down the end of the corridor to where Grantaire’s bedroom is. He hovers for a moment, not sure whether he should pop in to say good morning, or if that’s too much too fast, or – well, he’s seen Grantaire sleeping before. He’s seen Grantaire naked before. Honestly, he’s _slept_ next to Grantaire sleeping and naked before.

Enjolras gets all the way down the corridor before checking himself. No, Grantaire likely got to bed only a few hours before and he wouldn’t appreciated being woken up barely past sunrise. Enjolras peels his hand off the doorknob, and heads out, and settles for sending a quick text to Grantaire instead.

‘Morning. Still on for lunch today?’ Enjolras hits send when he’s standing at the bus stop, and then gets his phone back out when he’s on the bus, one hand curled into a dangling handle to stop himself from swaying into other people in the packed bus. ‘Well it’s probably not morning when you get this. If you get up too late for lunch, I have a break between talks around two. Schedule in overrunning and getting out of the crowd and we can do a late lunch around half two?’

Enjolras’s phone goes back into his pocket, at least until the bus goes around the corner, and he feels like he has to add something else. ‘I mean, if you’re not free don’t worry about it. I’m not trying to presume your day is just totally free for me.’

Ten minutes later, Enjolras has to scroll up three pages to reach the top of the texts he’s sent Grantaire, and there’s just a long stream of speech bubbles on his side of the screen. Enjolras stares at them all, and wonders if he can excuse this ridiculousness by the fact that it’s very early in the morning. He thumbs through them, and finds himself smiling inexplicably, imagining Grantaire groggily getting up to all these.

‘If you were a morning person, I could have just come in and said this all in person and not sound like an idiot texting to myself with no reply.’ That’s the last one Enjolras sends, and he resolutely zips his phone into his briefcase after that. He’s missed his stop, something he only realises when he looks up to see the bus almost completely empty, having dropped most people off at the convention centre. He swears, and gets off, dashing back up the street.

‘You made me late :(‘ That’s definitely the last text he’s sending Grantaire.

(It’s really not.)

Four hours later, his phone buzzes in his pocket, and Enjolras sees: ‘Bloody hell Enjolras. Stop typing for like ten minutes and let me read all these.’ He grins, and has to bite his lip so he can carry on looking like he’s a serious adult who’s actually concentrating.

Grantaire does end up meeting him for lunch, particularly easy to spot in his ratty jeans and band t-shirt amongst the sea of grey and black suits. They go for overpriced Chinese and get two different things and Enjolras finds himself opening up the box so that Grantaire can take half automatically; he blushes when he remembers what Combeferre had said about them sharing food.

“Your chopstick skills have not improved,” says Grantaire, rescuing a noodle before it can drop onto Enjolras’s lap, and then tucking it into his open mouth for him. It’s only because Enjolras has been over-thinking this for the last week that he realises that probably platonic friends don’t often do that sort of thing – but he and Grantaire have, always. He chews the noodle, and tries to catch Grantaire’s nose with his chopsticks.

“Shut up,” he grumbles.

Grantaire laughs, because Enjolras really is quite bad with chopsticks and stands no chance of getting his nose. “Come on, you don’t want to ruin that suit of yours.” The way Grantaire says that, accompanied by a sideways look, makes Enjolras look down at himself.

“What is it?” he asks, because there’s _something_ , but he can’t figure out what.

Grantaire shrugs. “You look inhumanly good in a suit. It makes me want to touch.”

Oh. Grantaire looks so casual, so composed as he says things like that. Enjolras supposes that he’s had a lot of practice controlling himself in front of Enjolras. “Well,” says Enjolras. He blushes, a blotchy sort of blush that spreads up his neck as he rubs at his nose in embarrassment. “I kind of want to touch you too? ...Maybe?”

Choking on a bit of chicken, Grantaire laughs out loud. “Oh my god. Oh, wow. You look like you’re going to explode from saying naughty words in public. Bless you.” Grantaire digs in to the fried rice, and smooths his face out. “I want to touch you everywhere. I want to strip you naked, or maybe leave you with just a tie on. I want to kiss around your stomach where it peeps out when you stretch upwards, and lick your collarbones. You have great collarbones. And maybe also suck you off, if you want that.”

Enjolras can feel himself getting steadily more red as Grantaire continues, his face as serious as if he were discussing marketing strategies, and he squirms in his seat because he hasn’t really… thought about it in detail before. The toe of Grantaire’s battered shoes suddenly runs up the inside of Enjolras’s calf, and he jerks. He also squeaks, but he denies that when it comes up afterwards. The sudden movement makes him realise that he is totally hard inside his trousers.

“Enjolras?” Grantaire’s dropped the act now, leaning over to look him in the eyes as his eyebrows furrow. “Are you okay? I didn’t mean to–”

“I’m fine,” says Enjolras a little too quickly. He doesn’t want Grantaire to think that he’s been scared off, or that he’s making Enjolras uncomfortable. At least not in that way. Grantaire is still looking like he’s regretting the dirty talk though, so Enjolras grabs his hand, plucks the chopsticks out of them, and pulls it under the table to press against his groin.

The heat of Grantaire’s palm makes him swallow hard, but it’s worth it to see the look of doubt wash off Grantaire’s face to be replaced by an open-mouthed gasp. It’s Grantaire’s turn to swallow. “Okay, well. I didn’t mean to do that either, but I’m not complaining,” says Grantaire, pulling his hand back reluctantly, not entirely successful at hiding his grin. “Are you sure you have to attend the rest of the afternoon?”

“Yes,” says Enjolras, still red and now no longer giving a damn about it. “But I already walked through the convention floor yesterday so I can probably get back a bit… earlier?” He’s already missing the light pressure of Grantaire’s hand.

When Enjolras has to get going for his next panel, they sweep their rubbish into a bin and then hover, not entirely sure how to say bye. “You know,” says Grantaire all in a rush. “I thought you’d just – you’d just want to be like before.”

“We are just like before,” says Enjolras, because it’s true. Any distance between them had fallen away easily.

Grantaire shoves his hands in his pockets. “I mean – huh. I meant that if you hadn’t wanted – to touch, or, or have sex – I would have been okay with that.”

“You would have settled,” says Enjolras with a grimace.

“I would have been happy,” says Grantaire softly. “It wouldn’t have been settling.” Enjolras has never been one for public displays of affection, but he hooks his fingers around Grantaire’s wrists, tugging them until he’s in the circle of Grantaire’s arms. He presses his hands lightly on Grantaire’s chest and he can feel the erratic thump-thump of Grantaire’s heart beneath one of them.

Enjolras leans forward, and presses the faintest of kisses against Grantaire’s lips. It’s distressing how such a small thing makes Grantaire look so surprised. “I’ll see you later, and you can do all those things you want to do to me,” says Enjolras quietly, with just the tiniest little push of his hips.

Grantaire shivers. “I’m going to be totally unproductive for the rest of today,” he says faintly.

–

The rest of the day is lost in a haze. Thankfully, Enjolras has a dictaphone and is pretty good at scribing, so hopefully he’ll just read all his notes and figure it out later. The bus ride back to Grantaire’s is spent drumming his fingers on his thigh and his hard-on is coming back with a vengeance the more he thinks about it – and he can’t stop thinking about it.

“Hey!” The call greets Enjolras before he’s even fully in through the door. It makes him grin.

“Hey,” he says back, seeing Grantaire rise up from the sofa, not even bothering to pretend that he had been doing anything but wait for Enjolras to get back. “How was the rest of your day?”

“Spent it wanking like a teenager,” says Grantaire unabashedly, and Enjolras has to sit down very suddenly on the sofa.

“Wow,” he says as desire curls up in his gut like a cramp.

Grantaire laughs, and sidles up next to Enjolras. “Did I break you?”

Turning his head and finding Grantaire’s face inches from his, Enjolras grins sheepishly. “A little bit.” He tips his head and Grantaire obligingly kisses him, soft and slow. Grantaire makes a sound like a contented cat and presses forward until he’s climbing onto Enjolras’s lap, straddling his legs and kissing Enjolras into the sofa.

Enjolras’s hands settle automatically onto Grantaire’s hips; he remembers what Grantaire had said about shirts riding up, and experimentally slips his fingers up under the bottom of the t-shirt and strokes the skin at the small of his back. Grantaire shudders.

In response, Enjolras’s stomach rumbles. They pull apart with a rueful laugh. “Let’s order pizza,” says Grantaire, rolling off Enjolras.

Enjolras blinks. “Why pizza?”

“Because,” says Grantaire already dialing because Enjolras always orders the same pizza and Grantaire knows it, “you can eat pizza in bed.”

They try to wait for pizza to get there before getting under way but then Enjolras complains about his shirt and how he wants to change out of it and that turns into Grantaire taking the shirt off for him, one button at a time, and Enjolras shivering at the ghost of Grantaire’s fingers over his skin and complaining that it isn’t fair that he’s the only one shirtless. Which might have turned into them rolling over the carpet as Grantaire refuses to take his t-shirt off and Enjolras trying to wrestle it off him, which is definitely what causes Grantaire to lick at Enjolras’s nipple to try and distract him; and Enjolras is suddenly flat on his back in the living room with Grantaire’s hand hot against his stomach, keeping him down as Grantaire scrapes his teeth across Enjolras’s nipple.

Enjolras fists his hand into the back of Grantaire’s t-shirt and yanks it up and over his head – where it of course gets suck, Grantaire bursting into giggles as they finally get it off – and the doorbell rings.

“Oh god, pizza,” says Grantaire as if he’d completely forgotten, and leaves Enjolras lying there on the floor for the delivery person to see as he goes to pay.

“Pizza,” repeats Enjolras numbly. He should probably get off the floor but he doesn’t really want to, and by the time he’s convinced himself that he should try, Cupcake has walked over and sat on top of his stomach. “Don’t you lick my nipple too,” says Enjolras severely; Grantaire snorts loudly.

Grantaire hooks one hand under Cupcake and lifts him away. “C’mon you. No action on the hot boy for you.” He sets the cat on the sofa where Cupcake just miaows at him, and hauls Enjolras up.

“Hot boy?” asks Enjolras.

“Hoy boy,” confirms Grantaire with a smile, balancing the pizza boxes in one hand and tugging Enjolras to the bedroom with the other. Behind them, Cupcake makes a nest of Enjolras’s shirt.

Grantaire’s bedroom is similar to the one he’d had at university. It’s bigger, obviously, and there are a couple of art pieces Enjolras doesn’t recognise, but there are also old posters and the corkboard of gig tickets pinned to it. It feels familiar.

By the time Enjolras has finished looking around, Grantaire is already flopped onto the bed, pizza box open and halfway through his first slice. Enjolras slides onto his side of the bed – and they’ve had their sides of the bed since first year of university, how ridiculous is that – and grabs a slice of pizza. They eat mostly in silence, because Enjolras really is ravenous after a long day, but at some point their legs get tangled together.

“So hey,” says Grantaire after they’ve inhaled enough pizza to settle the initial hunger pangs, “I actually got us dessert too.” He licks his fingers clean, exaggerating it once he notices Enjolras watching.

“Yes?” says Enjolras, trying to look away. His eyes flick back to watched Grantaire’s tongue out of their own accord, and Grantaire grins.

“So. Well,” says Grantaire, and then reaches over the side of the bed with no more explanation. There’s the rustle of a plastic bag, something being pulled out, and then he sets a box of heart-shaped chocolates on the bed between them.

Enjolras looks at them in horror. “It isn’t Valentine’s Day, is it?” he asks, his brain suddenly wiping blank. It takes him a worryingly long moment to remember that it’s the middle of June.

Grantaire laughs. “You remember!”

Finishing his pizza, Enjolras pulls open the box. He looks for the chocolate truffle, because it’s Grantaire’s favourite, and puts it between his teeth. “Hey!” says Grantaire, slightly miffed before realising that Enjolras is holding it out for him. He leans forward and takes the chocolate from Enjolras’s mouth, leaving a lingering taste of chocolate. “Worst Valentine’s Day ever,” he confides. “I couldn’t tell if you were playing a joke on me or not.”

Enjolras reaches out, squeezes his hand. “Sorry.”

“Not your fault,” says Grantaire. “You got there eventually.” He takes the dark chocolate one and feeds it to Enjolras, and if Enjolras licks his fingers more than is necessary then, well, it leads to Grantaire’s eyelids fluttering closed and the two of them pushing the food out of the way and Grantaire half rolled on top of Enjolras, sucking his lower lip into his mouth and stroking down the bare skin of his side with his fingertips.

“I leave tomorrow afternoon,” says Enjolras quietly. He doesn’t want to ruin the mood, but it’s something that been niggling him at the back of his mind for the last day.

“London to Paris isn’t all that far,” says Grantaire, stroking Enjolras’s cheek. “And you travel for work. And I travel for work. We didn’t see each other for five years and that barely made a dent, I highly doubt a few months here and there are going to do it now.”

It should be odd, Enjolras thinks, that Grantaire is the one confident that the long-distance isn’t going to be a problem, but then he supposes that Grantaire has a lot of experience with patience and waiting. “Okay,” says Enjolras.

Grantaire’s eye takes on a glint. “So I hope you don’t mind staying up all night. We’ve got things to catch up on.”

“Things,” says Enjolras amusedly as Grantaire nibbles along the length of his jaw and down his neck, stubble scraping Enjolras’s skin.

“Things,” confirms Grantaire, his voice warm in the hollow of Enjolras’s throat. “I am going to hold you and cuddle you so hard. So hard, Enjolras.”

Enjolras laughs and hooks his legs over Grantaire’s hips, experimentally rolling his hips. “And other things too, I hope.”

“Yes,” growls Grantaire, grinding back down and pressing himself to Enjolras so he can feel the way Enjolras writhes at the contact. “And other things too.” He presses a kiss just behind Enjolras’s ear. “But mostly the cuddling and holding,” he admits quietly, and Enjolras wraps his arms around Grantaire in a hug, breathing his presence into tight grasps.

–

The train back to Paris is spent in a sleep-deprived daze, because Grantaire had not been kidding around making up for lost time, and despite the shower he’d had just before he left, Enjolras is fairly sure he still smells the remnants of Grantaire on him. He can still feel the stretch as he walks, the bruises on his thighs, the wrung out feeling of multiple orgasms and lazy making out in between. He tells Grantaire so, in great detail, over text.

Grantaire sends him back a picture of his erection, and Enjolras has to go and take advantage of the large toilets in the Eurostar.

Courfeyrac is waiting for Enjolras at Gare du Nord. “So,” says Courfeyrac, and then stops.

“So,” agrees Enjolras, because he’s never needed that many words to communicate with his friends. Courf bumps his shoulders, and Enjolras bumps them back good-naturedly. “We’re going to get more funding,” he says instead.

“I should hope so,” says Courfeyrac. “You’re an instant fandom classic, by the way.” He hands over his phone as Enjolras gets into the passenger seat. It’s opened to an internet page, that site Courfeyrac writes fanfiction on, and Enjolras’s eyebrows shoot up as he reads the summary.

“Really? You wrote fic of my life,” says Enjolras but honestly he’s too content to care.

“I wrote half a fic of your life,” says Courfeyrac cheerfully. “You haven’t told me the ending yet.”

When they get home, Combeferre is holding a bunch of flowers, and looking grudgingly impressed. “They’re for you,” says Combeferre, and hands them over to Enjolras. “They just got delivered.”

Enjolras takes them. The little label reads ‘for my sunshine x’, and it triggers a memory in the back of his mind. He puts the flowers down, carefully, and calls Grantaire. “The first three months of uni,” he says when Grantaire answers. “I got a bunch of flowers every week. Really beautiful, expensive flowers, and I never knew who they were from. That was you, wasn’t it?”

Grantaire snorts. “Yes. And literally everyone else knew it was me.”

Sitting down, Enjolras reaches out to touch one of the soft petals. “But I spent hours moaning to you that I didn’t know who it was.”

“I know. And I thought for at least a month and a half that you were teasing me about it.”

Enjolras swallows as the scope of it hits him. There are probably a dozen things, two dozen things, a thousand things, that Grantaire has done for him that he’s never known about. “I don’t deserve you.”

There’s a bit of a pause. “No,” says Grantaire. “But you got me anyway. I love you.”

Enjolras stands, grabs the flowers. They’re going to need water. “I think I could love you too,” he says finally.

And he can hear the smile in Grantaire’s voice. “That’s good enough for me.”

**Author's Note:**

> This fic is based ~~in part~~ largely on sarahyyy's life, as chronicled in these posts here: [x](http://sarah-yyy.tumblr.com/post/89149020433/guys-help-i-feel-like-i-am-the-enjolras-to-this) [x](http://sarah-yyy.tumblr.com/post/89149475503/i-know-five-years-ago-back-in-2009-when-i-was) [x](http://sarah-yyy.tumblr.com/post/89149881938/guys-i-got-him-chocolates-for-valentines-day) [x](http://sarah-yyy.tumblr.com/post/89150733268/while-were-on-the-topic-of-oblivious-sarah-in)
> 
> I, of course, am Courfeyrac. Come find me on [tumblr](defractum.tumblr.com)!


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